MOSCOW, September 28. /TASS/: Moscow is raising alarm bells over the mounting strife in Kosovo’s north, since the developments there have been going "from bad to worse", Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova stated in an official commentary.
"Moscow is concerned over the increasing tensions in Kosovo, provoked by the irresponsible actions of Kosovo’s Albanian authorities. From September 20, Pristina has effectively obstructed the movement of traffic between northern regions of Serbia and the central part of Serbia," the comment says. There is a concentration of police forces, special forces, armored vehicles and heavy weapons. Civilians have been subjected to violence, and there have been victims among them. Several people have been hospitalized. At present, it is obvious that events are veering down a path going "from bad to worse,"
Zakharova stressed that the Community of Serb Municipalities, whose establishment was intended as a way to effectively guarantee the rights and interests of the Serbs in the province, remains on paper due to sabotage by Pristina, who "is committed to asserting its complete control over the territory through its repressive apparatus of the self-proclaimed Kosovo State." "In fact, this is another expulsion wave to oust the Serbs from the province," the diplomat specified.
The Foreign Ministry spokeswoman focused on the fact that "the practices of Pristina’s policymakers do not get their due assessment either from Brussels authorized to contribute to finding a negotiated solution to the problem between Belgrade and Pristina, or from Washington, who the Kosovars have long aligned themselves with."
"We emphasize once again that NATO’s Kosovo Force (KFOR) and the European Union Rule of Law Mission have the required mandates to prevent lawlessness, and bear full responsibility for protecting the civilian population, as well as ensuring peace and security. It’s time to put some pressure on the administration in Pristina to compel it to withdraw the security forces from the north of Kosovo and prevent the situation from spiraling into an open conflict," Zakharova concluded.
